A Last Poet In Senegal – the Daddy Rapper

Day 4, February 4, 2015

In December of 2012, I had a wonderful opportunity to visit Senegal, West Africa. The American embassy sponsored my trip, and, I  accompanied  a group of artists, storytellers, poets and musicians. Tony Vacca and his World Rhythms Ensemble was the umbrella for this occasion.

The American Embassy was actually funding the Hip Hop Academy in Dakar, the capital and largest city of Senegal — that I didn’t know before the trip. It appears, because of the global appeal of Hip Hop, America has decided to use Hip Hop as an ambassador, of sorts, in establishing a relationship with the country. My group, The Last Poets, had performed in Senegal before. We had had a memorable performance on Goree Island, the place where Africans were imprisoned until they were put on slave ships headed to the Americas.

My lady and I had visited Senegal many years earlier, staying in the Five Star Savannah Hotel overlooking Gorée. We visited Gorée, also, and tried to imagine the horror our ancestors felt as they went through the “Door of No Return”. Legends say that pools of sharks would be waiting for bodies falling into the ocean from that door. According to many accounts, twenty million were imprisoned there while six million died, even before they got onto the ships.

I remember one day, my lady and I decided to check out this other Five Star hotel in the center of town, The Karenga. We had lunch there and on our way out, we ran into Danny Glover, his wife and daughter. I recognized him, and, he recognized me from my work in The Last Poets. We sat in the lobby and conversed for about an hour. Danny tried to get me to go Barracuda fishing with him, but I declined. My lady and I had had a previous fishing trip in Barbados some years before, and, it was not a very good experience. The fishermen who took us on their boat were the most popular fishermen in the area, and yet, that day they caught not one fish. The word got around that we were bad luck for fishermen. I didn’t want to repeat that—I wanted to relish in each moment.

Being a Last Poet has afforded me some experiences and travels that I could not ever imagine. The Last Poets was born May 19, 1968. The original members were Gylan Kain, David Nelson and myself, Charles Davis, soon to be known as Abiodun Oyewole. There was a big celebration of the life of Malcolm “X” being held in Mount Morris Park in Harlem where David discussed the idea of poets working together as a group, an example of unity, that other Black folks could follow. On April 4, 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King was assassinated. I felt the need to respond to this tragedy in whatever way I could. The cry, at the time, was Black Power. The Last Poets became the poetic voice for that movement.

The name of our group, The Last Poets, was derived from a poem by a South African poet named Kogostili. The title of his poem is Towards a Walk in the Sun. The poem describes the dehumanizing experience of Black South African people under the rule of Apartheid. At the end of the poem, the poet typed in bold print. ”THIS WIND YOU HEAR IS THE BIRTH OF MEMORY WHEN THE MOMENT HATCHES IN TIME’S WOMB THERE WILL BE NO ART TALK THE ONLY POEM YOU WILL HEAR WILL BE THE SPEARPOINT PIVOTED INTO THE PUNCTURED MARROW OF THE VILLIAN AND THE TIMELESS NATIVE SON DANCING LIKE CRAZY TO RETRIEVE RHYTHMS OF DESIRE FADING INTO MEMORY”. David Nelson added, “Therefore we are The Last Poets of the world”—this was our creed, our proclamation. It was our name, and, our poetry that laid down the foundation for Hip Hop. Our first album was released in 1970 —by word of mouth, over a half-million albums were sold. The Last Poets are still performing around the country and around the world. The present working members of the group are Umar Bin Hassan, the author of a Last Poet classic Niggers are scared of Revolution. Baba Don Eaton, our percussionist and myself. Since 1968, there have been a total of seven poets performing as a Last Poet. David Nelson, Gylan Kain, Felipe Luciano, Umar Bin Hassan, Jalial Mansur Nurriddin , Sulaiman El Hadi and myself Abiodun. We have had also two major percussionists who were masters at playing the drums. Nilija (Raymond Hurrey) and presently Baba Don. It’s been truly amazing how popular we’ve become around the world. Over the last twenty years, we have performed all over Europe, North, West and South Africa and Mexico. People, wherever, oppressed by their governments, The Last Poets are welcomed with open arms. Hip Hop has fueled a new spoken word era. Poetry has become a significant voice for young people everywhere. The Last Poet’s most recent documentary was filmed in Paris, by filmmaker Claude Santiago. It’s an excellent job of telling our story.

For over thirty years now, every Sunday, I’ve been hosting an Open House in my apartment. Here, poets, singers, dancers and musicians share their gifts. We also eat together, and, have very stimulating discussions about the state of Blacks today. Now that I am one of the more experienced poets around, I feel obligated to give back, to help others develop their craft and offer guidance.

On December 20, 2014, I made another trip to Senegal. This trip was not sponsored by the American embassy. I was brought to Senegal by, a young man named, Malaal. He runs a Hip Hop Center in the suburbs of Dakar. He is into conscious Hip Hop. Not the kind of Hip Hop that uses the word “nigger” or produces videos of sisters shaking their behinds. Malaal is diametrically opposed to that kind of Hip Hop. He brought me Senegal to highlight conscious Hip Hop and poetry. My Wolof (an urban mixture of French and Arabic) speaking skills are small—but I can speak a little French. So in French, at a huge Hip Hop festival, I said Tu n’es pas Nigger, Tu es African! I kept saying it until the crowd began repeating it. I was later told that the young people were listening to me because they’ve dubbed me “the Daddy Rapper”.

I learned a lot about the cultural differences of the Senegalese and ours. The music and the food, I enjoyed. Eating with the Senegalese is a completely different experience. Everyone eats from the same platter, and, your utensil is your right hand. A sleeping place, in many cases, is a mattress on the floor, and sometimes, a nearby bucket of water is used to flush the toilet. Many of us Americans take for granted having certain amenities like toilet paper. If you visit Senegal, you may have to bring your own, that’s unless you’re staying in a Five Star hotel.

There have been many very different experiences in all of my trips to Senegal, but they’ve always been rewarding ones. Reinforcing my pride in my race and the motherland. I marvel at the creativity, the resilience and the beauty of the Senegalese. I am looking forward to my next visit and the possibility of visiting another country on the African continent. The strength, the beauty, the creativity and the warmth of the people were impressive. Just to be in the Motherland was a joy and a dream come true. As I listened to the young rappers in Senegal, it sounded like Hip Hop may have been born in Africa a long time ago, and, has simply found its way back home.

• Author
• Recent Posts

Abiodun Oyewole

Latest posts by Abiodun Oyewole (see all)

• Abiodun Oyewole’s Open House with African-American Poets - 10/01/2021
• The African American Father - 06/21/2020
• The Responsibility of the African American Athlete - 06/12/2020